


This Bloody Library

by haleyisafangirl (haleingoutside)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Fluff, I Tried, Library, kind of fluffy i guess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-05
Updated: 2016-05-05
Packaged: 2018-06-06 13:40:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6756451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haleingoutside/pseuds/haleyisafangirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lily and James spend a lot of time together in the bloody library.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This Bloody Library

**Author's Note:**

> I found this the other day buried deep in my fanfiction folder and I actually think it's okay? Which was surprising. Each little section is a new scene. I hope you enjoy!

“Pay attention!” Lily hissed through her teeth at stupid Potter, who had been staring across the library at a pretty Ravenclaw for the past half hour. He blinked rapidly, refocusing on the redhead and textbook in front of him. “Honestly,” Lily said, rolling her eyes, “having to snap my fingers in front of your eyes every ten minutes is not worth a Galleon and a Sugar Quill.”

James pouted and began to whine. “Pleeeeeeeeeease, Evans, I desperately need your help, I’ll do horribly without you…”

“Oh, shut up you prat and get on with the nuances of nonverbal Charms.”

James smirked. “Knew I could count on you, Lils.”

“Count on my sugar addiction is more like it.” He shrugged and picked up his quill once more, glad to be seated across one of the smartest girls in the whole school.

* * *

James looked a mix between amused and bewildered as he glimpsed Lily Evans across the library, nearly tearing her hair out as she pored over some textbook. “All right there, Evans?” Her head snapped up and he couldn’t tell whether she was more likely to blow fire at him or burst into tears. After a moment, she just sort of wilted in her chair, looking resigned.

“I hate Transfiguration,” she mumbled, glancing back down to her textbook as if it held the meaning of life and she had given up any hope of ever finding it. He pulled out the chair across from hers and cringed as it made a loud screeching noise.

“Want some help?” he offered. Lily actually barked a laugh in his face. “I’m serious!” he insisted, a little indignant at her not thinking he would be of assistance. “You know I’m one of the best in our class at Transfiguration.” Lily actually bit her lip at this, legitimately considering his offer but hesitant about accepting it. Finally, she spoke.

“Oh, fiiiiine.” James fist-pumped and opened up his own textbook.

* * *

 

“James, it’s literally one of the simplest Charms in the book.”

“Well, that apparently makes me one of the simplest blokes in the school, doesn’t it?”

“I just don’t understand what’s so difficult about this!”

“Lily, you know I’m not good at Charms, so why are you treating me like I’m five years old?!”

“Maybe I wouldn’t if you’d be mature instead of hexing some first year every five seconds and making really inappropriate jokes all the time.”

“Oh, shut it, Evans.”

“Back to surnames, are we? I thought you said that was such a fifth year thing to do, and now that we’re almost done with sixth we were supposed to grow up, although it would seem you’ve been rather unsuccessful at that bit.”

Lily clenched her teeth angrily as James ran a hand through his hair and tilted his head upward to the ceiling. He looked legitimately frustrated, but not with Lily: with himself. She couldn’t help it; something like pity made it difficult for her to concentrate on the task at hand. After a moment, she said his name softly, sliding her hand across the table to rest on top of his other one. He startled at this, eyes widening as though he had completely forgotten she was there at all. “Let’s give it another go, yeah?”

He exhaled sharply through his teeth. “Yeah.”

* * *

“Hey, Lils.”

“Please don’t call me that,” Lily responded immediately, her eyes still trained on the Parchment in front of her.

“Someone’s grumpy,” James teased, and Lily’s nostrils flared in indignation.

“Really not in the mood today, Potter.”

“Aren’t surnames a little immature for Head Boy and Girl?”

Lily looked up and blinked rapidly, and something about her expression made James pause. “Yes, Potter, I am just so immature. But maybe I don’t want to grow up! Maybe I don’t want to have to deal with stupid N.E.W.T.s and being Head Girl and managing Marlene’s drinking habits and failing Transfiguration because instead of helping me with my stupid essay you’re pointing out every single grammatical mistake and spelling error! And Voldemort’s just around the corner and everyone’s thinking I’ll just take in stride like I do with everything else! I’m not perfect, and I know it’s what everyone expects of me but I just - I can’t do it, all right?” She was blinking harder now, trying to keep tears inside her eyes.

“Lily,” said a flustered James, “it’s okay--”

“No, it’s not!” she practically screeched. “I am not okay, and I’m sick of acting like I am when most days it feels like my whole world is just falling to pieces!” With this she bolted out of the library, leaving James in her wake to carry her things back to Gryffindor Tower, wondering the entire time whether it was something he had said.

* * *

 

“I’m sorry,” said a small voice coming from James’s right. Startled, he looked up from his book to see a timid smile and red hair pulled back in a ponytail.

“No, I am,” James said. “I shouldn’t have been so mean to you.” Lily took this as an invitation to sit down and took the chair next to him, her arm brushing against his as she leaned over.

“What book are you reading?” The question didn’t sound so much like an attempt at small talk as desperately grabbing on for a lifeline of conversation. Lily tilted her head to read the title. “ _ Anna Karenina _ ?” she asked disbelievingly, arching an eyebrow.

“It’s Sirius’s,” James explained. “I have no idea how he enjoys such rubbish, but I’m trying.”

Lily smiled, then sighed. “Listen,” she began, “McGonagall gave me an extension on that Transfiguration essay. I don’t suppose you could…”

“Help you out with it?”

“You don’t have to, I mean, I know you’re… busy…” she said by way of apology, gesturing to his book.

James leaned over to look her straight in the eyes. “I would love to,” he said with a smile that actually looked sincere. “And no immature joking this time.” Lily laughed sheepishly.

“Yeah… About that… I dunno. Just got a little overwhelmed, I suppose. I’m really sorry--”

“Don’t be,” James cut her off. “I like listening to you.” Lily broke eye contact to look at the table, and it could have just been the shadows of the library, but James could have sworn he saw her face grow red. “After all, that’s what friends are for, right?” She looked back up to smile at him gratefully, and that little moment made everything that could ever follow completely worth it.

* * *

“Thought I’d find you here,” Lily said smugly as she settled across from James in the window alcove. “Sirius and Remus didn’t even think to look in the library. I think they underestimate your academic dedication.”

“Well, it’s not exactly schoolwork at the moment…” his explanation trailed off. He held up his copy of  _ Anna Karenina _ .

“Do you know I got two chapters into that bloody mess and physically could not keep going? It was awful! So depressing and moody!” 

James laughed, using a free hand to muss his hair. “You know, part of it is the difficulties of translation. If you’d like, I could read it to you in Russian.”

Lily’s eyebrows drew together in confusion. “You speak Russian?”

“Of course!” James insisted before attempting a truly horrible Russian accent in which her name came out like a bizzare flavor of ice cream. Lily laughed so hard that Madam Abbott came over and told them to be quiet.

“You could read it to me in English, yeah?” James swallowed, and was it… did he look… nervous? No, not possibly. Either way, he turned to the first page - “No no no, start at chapter three! I can’t relive that boring nonsense.” - and began to read aloud.

Neither of them knew how it got to be half past nine and they were late for patrols. Neither of them knew how they had fallen asleep. Neither of them knew how Lily had ended up snuggled against James, her head resting against his chest, his arms curled around her and still holding the book open to some page about something Russian. The only thing that was clear in their moments after being sharply awoken was the pain of Madam Abbott pinching their ears and hauling them from the library.

“Unbelievable!” she was ranting. “Never, in all my days… and Head Boy and Girl, too…”

Lily’s face was redder than her hair as she and James made the silent walk back to Gryffindor Tower. “I’m really sorry--” James began, but Lily cut him off.

“No, no,” she insisted in a voice that was an octave higher than normal. “Completely fine. It’s fine.”

James gave the password to the Fat Lady and they stepped inside Gryffindor Tower, embarrassment levels mounting even higher when Sirius wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.

“Er…”

“Yeah, I should probably…”

“Getting…”

“Late, definitely.”

They both paused awkwardly. “G’night,” they rang out simultaneously, Lily with fake cheeriness, James with utter humiliation, as they hurried up the stairs to blush in private.

* * *

“Will you cut it out?” Lily whispered across the library to James before starting to giggle. He launched another balled up piece of parchment in her direction. “I’m not joking!” she continued, throwing down her quill in exasperation, though the grin on her face suggested she was actually having a decent amount of fun. “Come over here and help me, you idiot.”

James made a big show of how difficult it was to stand up and walk the five meters between them as Lily stifled another laugh, shaking her head. “I will gladly help you, Miss Evans,” he said pompously, leaving Lily no choice but to giggle silently before smacking him on the arm.

“I have to work,” she hissed.

James sighed dramatically. “Fine,” he said, dragging the word out to more than three syllables and eleven different pitches. “What is it you need help with?”

“The significance of the third exception to Gamp’s Law of Elemental Transfiguration.”

“Ah, yes, that. Well… it’s a funny story, really, my mum and Gamp go way back.”

“They do not,” Lily said, looking up to the ceiling in frustration.

“No, really. They actually dated for a while, I’m told... with no shortage of bragging from my mother, I might add.”

“You know, I really don’t think the significance of the third exception to Gamp’s Law of Elemental Transfiguration is that it made him a better kisser.” James just grinned mischievously.

“I’m not going to get any work done while you’re here, am I?” Lily asked, reluctantly shutting her textbook.

“Nope!” James assured her cheerfully. Lily rolled her eyes but continued to smile.

“You’re a prat.”

“Ah, but I’m your favorite prat.”

Lily didn’t argue.

* * *

“Pay attention!” Lily hissed through her teeth at James, who sat across the table making funny faces at her.

“You know, I think your hair looks especially red today,” he commented, leaning across the table to twirl a strand around his index finger.

“You know what I think? I think you need to do well in Charms to become an Auror.”

James sighed loudly. “But Charms is so booooooring. You’re much more interesting, love.” He tilted his head and grinned, and Lily’s lips did that little twitch they did when she was trying to be annoyed but not succeeding because James was just too adorable.

“I could never fancy a boy who got an ‘Acceptable’ or lower on his Charms’ N.E.W.T., you know.”

James’s jaw dropped in indignation, though Lily knew he was only teasing her, as she was teasing him. “I could say the same about a girl who doesn’t know how to turn a bouquet of daisies into roses.”

Lily tilted her head thoughtfully, touching her quill to the corner of her mouth. “I did turn the biggest idiot in school into my boyfriend, though.”

James nodded. “Well, yes, I suppose you did do that. So, really, you must be quite brilliant at Transfiguration if you changed your own mind that much.”

“Well, you changed, too. Of your own accord.”

“Oh, I know. We’ve all grown up, I think.”

Lily leaned across the table to where her forehead was nearly touching James’s as he leaned toward her. “I agree,” she said softly.

“The library is a wildly inappropriate place to kiss,” James remarked, suddenly quiet. The corner of Lily’s mouth twitched upwards.

“That is why,” she rang out cheerfully, “we are not going to do it!” She leaned back in her chair and laughed triumphantly as James groaned. “Come off it, you’ve got a lot of studying to do.”

“But I don’t want to,” James complained.

“You know, it really would be wonderful to spend the rest of my life with an Auror. It’d be a shame if your Charms N.E.W.T. kept you from getting to grow old with me.”

James glanced up. “I reckon you’ll be rather pretty in your old age.”

“Charms,” Lily insisted, tapping his book repeatedly. James continued to stare at her.

“Of course, not as pretty as you are now. You’re bloody gorgeous. I never get tired of looking at you. And talking to you. And being with you. And calling you my girlfriend.”

“I get an equal amount of pleasure in calling… you… an… idiot!” Lily said, thwacking him on the nose with her quill and trying not to laugh as she said each word. “Focus!” she said with a final tap on his nose, which James wrinkled. He glumly reopened his book and picked up his own quill once more.

“You do know I love you, right?” Lily asked several moments later. James looked up at her and grinned.

“Of course. And you better know I love you. Godric knows I do enough to prove it.”

“Like what?” Lily exclaimed. James leaned forward again, staring into her green eyes with the air of someone who has something very important to say.

“Like spending so much time in this. bloody. library!”


End file.
